Al sale!

The man in the house wanted some action and thus after preparing our lunch, namely the pesce al sale, he took the stand to break the salt crust.

[caption id=”attachment_540" align=”aligncenter” width=”300" caption=”Chris taking the stand!”]

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You can try this recipe with any type of fish you like, use fish with scales on or you can use fish which have a thicker layer of skin. I tried it with ‘cerviol’ or amberjack.

Fish baked in a salt crust

Serves 4

• 1.5/2 kg fish, cleaned with scales on
• 4 kg sea salt
• 3 egg whites
• 4 sprigs of fresh thyme
• 4 sprigs of fresh rosemary
• Extra virgin olive oil

Beat the egg whites until fluffy. Add the sea salt to the egg whites and mix well. Sprinkle the salt with some cold water, to make it damp. Take a large ovenproof dish, place a layer of salt at the bottom. In the meantime, drizzle the fish with olive oil from both sides and place on the bed of salt. Take the sprigs of rosemary and thyme and place them in the fish’s cavity. Cover the fish with the remaining salt, making sure that there are no uncovered gaps; although you can leave head and tail uncovered.

Cook in a preheated oven of 200C for 40 minutes. Remove fish from oven, leave to cool then break the salt crust with a knife. Scrape off any excessive salt from the fish, remove bones and serve with lemon wedges and good quality olive oil.